


The Borderline

by Clarice Chiara Sorcha (claricechiarasorcha)



Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Crack Treated Seriously, M/M, Poor Life Choices, Post-The Last Jedi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-17
Updated: 2018-01-17
Packaged: 2019-03-06 01:28:59
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,693
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13400583
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/claricechiarasorcha/pseuds/Clarice%20Chiara%20Sorcha
Summary: Sometimes, going over the edge is far more entertaining than just walking it forever.





	The Borderline

**Author's Note:**

  * For [](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts).



> ...I came home from work early today because I'm sad and tired and don't know what to do with myself, and ended up falling asleep to _Unsolved Mysteries_. Then I woke up and decided to cheer myself up by writing gingerpilot smut. I don't know. Things are weird.
> 
> Also, I blame [@7porgs](http://7porgs.tumblr.com). Just because. xx.
> 
>  **ETA:** ...and [THIS](http://7porgs.tumblr.com/post/169838251963/ive-been-crying-over-claricechiarasorchas) is the most gorgeous accompaniment, oh wow. <3 <3 <3

Poe had volunteered for the mission without a second thought. Despite Leia’s knowing look, still she had let him go. She’d long ago become the one who understood him best. But what followed that thought was often and inevitable faint fear of what they all would do, when she was gone.

But he had something to do now, and that would be enough.

Much as he loved the company of others, it had come as something of a relief to get away from it. The small Core moon had a sparse population, serving mostly as a service station on the routes between far more interesting worlds. Perhaps it was because the bustle of the Resistance simply didn’t exist the way it had before – they were more than they had been, but even that could not hide the fact that so many faces were still missing. They had been consigned to history; left behind, Poe sometimes felt as though he walked amongst ghosts.

Leaving the dock where he’d parked his anonymous little puddle-jumper of a ship, he checked his comm unit for the coordinates of his meeting point. Voices, across the way, had him looking over with a frown; this tended to be a quiet place, not the kind of moon for a brawl out in the street.

A slender figure in robes stood before the berth just across from his, before a sorry-looking shuttle that had most certainly seen better days. The mechanic he had engaged with apparently had won their dispute; after throwing his arms into the air, he slumped away, moving quick towards the street beyond.

It was not something he ought to get himself involved in. Poe couldn’t help doing precisely that, mooching over to the mechanic. It didn’t miss his gaze that the man had watched the shuttle’s owner slope away into the nearby cantina with something near-predatory in his dark eyes.

“What was that about?”

“What?” He glanced over, then grunted to recognise him as the one who had come in just before. “Ship’s dead. Surprised it got this far. And he hasn’t got the credits to pay for repair.” Those dark eyes narrowed, now, suspicion sparking from his tongue. “What’s it to you?”

He shrugged, jacket moving smoothly over broad shoulders. “Just curious.”

And he snorted, looked back the way the other man had vanished. “I’m sure he can work off his debt. Pretty thing, lovely hair.”

Poe hid his burgeoning frown behind a raised eyebrow. “Oh, it’s like that, then?”

“Why are you worried?” The mechanic rummaged in one pocket, came up with a cigarra; flicking it alight, he filled his lungs to almost alarming capacity. Only when he’d breathed out a long exhale did he give Poe an arch look. “With an accent like he’s got, he’s only Outer Rim trash anyway.”

Dryly, Poe surreptitiously sidestepped the cloud. “That bad, huh.”

Again the mechanic’s eyes wandered, his lips quirking. There was nothing kind in his speculative gaze. “At a guess I’d say he’s Arkanian. Which isn’t bad, I suppose.” He turned back to Poe with a leer, sucking deeper yet on his cigarra. “You know what they say about Arkanian boys.”

“Seen a few things scrawled on bathroom walls, sure.” Now Poe didn’t bother to mask his disgust, turning away. “Catch you later, buddy.”

Even when out of the man’s vicinity, still his skin crawled. And there, across the way, lay the cantina where the man had disappeared. There was no real thought to any of it. Moving inside, Poe found it both tidy and quiet enough, custom thin on the ground at this time of day. Glancing around the dim interior, it took no detective work to locate the robed man, seated in the corner and hunched over a datapad.

A glance at his chrono told him that the rendezvous was not close. He had the time, even as some part of his brain said that this was precisely the kind of idiot thing Leia had been telling him not to do. Poe still let his feet take him to the bar. Two drinks ordered: a local lager, the head foamy and thick. Still without thought he then carried it across to the table, setting them both down; when he withdrew, both hands left moist bleeding imprint in the condensation.

“Hey. Mind if I sit here?” He tilted his head on purpose, his hips more by instinct. “There’s a drink in it, for you.”

“Not interested.”

Poe supposed the creepy dude’s impression had been more or less correct; the man had a very broad accent, lilting and thick, something like what one would hear from the Arkanis system, if not the planet Arkanis itself. Poe only had the vaguest knowledge of what those people sounded like – considering they had been Imperials and then Centrists, it wasn’t as if his own beliefs had ever aligned with that of the standard citizen – but he figured it a fair guess.

And in answer he slid into the seat opposite, though the open door remained on the other side of the room, right where he’d first walked through it. “It’s not just a drink, though.”

“It’s never just a _drink_.”

That twisted in his guts. “Not what I meant,” he said, light words met by silence. “But you’re not entirely wrong,” he went on, and the man’s fingers continued to move over his unseen screen.

“I’m also not interested.”

“But that guy you were talking to over the way is.” His fingers stuttered but a moment, went on. “He’s a piece of shit. Don’t fuck him for repairs, you’d be lucky to break atmo when he was done with it.”

Now, at last, he stilled. “What?”

“Didn’t quite like the way your conversation looked. Went over, had a chat after you came in here.” Leaving his drink untouched for the moment, Poe leaned back in his chair, stretched out one leg beside the narrow table. “He made it pretty clear he’s not much interested in a good deal, but he’s obviously heard about the boys at the Academy.” There he paused, and then: “You _are_ from Arkanis, right?”

Now he turned very, very still. “Perhaps.”

“Don’t make a deal with him,” he advised, and cut his losses even as he rose. “Just a bit of advice, dude.” He could always get a better drink at his hotel. “Catch you later.”

“Wait.” Even as Poe halted, the man added sharply, “Sit down.”

The command of it felt strange, forceful; something of the soldier in even Poe Dameron felt compelled to do so. And still the man looked at his datapad, though his fingers had long since stopped their dance.

“You’re Poe Dameron,” he said, very quiet, and the shiver down his spine felt like a hangman’s noose pulled sudden and taut.

“Are you my contact?”

“Not in the way you’re thinking.” And when he looked up, even beneath the continued shadow of his cowl, even behind the thick beard and the floppy fringe of too-long hair, Poe _knew_ him.

“General Hux.”

And he snorted, waved a hand in a dismissal that looked more like the swing of an executioner’s blade. “Just Hux, these days.” The curve of his lips resembled anger more than amusement. “I think you’ll find I’ve resigned my commission,” he added, and then his lips pressed tight and flat. “And do leave that blaster in its holster, Commander.” Even as Poe’s hand stilled, he felt a swift poke at his thigh beneath the table. “That’s the wrong end of my monomolecular blade, by the way. But I can flip it any time I like.”

Poe grinned, wide and humourless. “So forward.” Leaning forward, carefully casual, he said, “And on a first date, too!”

Hux did not move. “How did you find me?”

“I didn’t know I was looking for you.” A harder poke, and he grimaced, tried again. “I’m _serious_. I’m out here on rebel business. I didn’t even know…” Trailing off, Poe allowed the reality of the man’s words to hit him full force. “You _really_ resigned your commission?”

“Really really.” One eyebrow cocked high. “Not that I’m keen for word to get around.”

Certainly that information hadn’t come to them through any grapevine they tended to, but in retrospect news of the general had been thin on the ground recently. “Kylo Ren can’t have appreciated that.”

“Not particularly.” Much as Hux’s words appeared emotionless, Poe knew enough of masks and make-believe to recognise the effort it took. “But he’s likely even less keen than I am for rumours to spread, so.”

“So,” he echoed. Then coughed. “Shit.”

“Yes, well.”

A long pause followed. There appeared only one sensible way to end it. “I need that drink, now.” Picking up the glass nearest him, Poe half drained it in one go. The entire time those eyes fixed on his, face mostly shadowed still in his cowl. Without too much thought, Poe replaced his own glass on the table, pushed the other over. “I think you need one, too.”

“How do I know it’s not poisoned?”

Reaching over with a snort, Poe downed half of it, pushed it back. The affronted look on his face was almost worth the way his stomach felt dangerously overloaded. “Hey, I paid for that.”

With a frown Hux took it in one hand as if it were an unpinned grenade. Several delicate sips followed before he seemed to come to some sort of decision: with head thrown back, Hux chugged the entire thing. The sharp movement knocked his cowl back; the hair beneath had become so much thicker, so much _wilder_. The extraordinary colour of his beard had Poe unabashed in his staring. He’d known the red of his hair from holos, but had never thought it would quite this: _striking_.

The slam of the glass upon the table yanked his attention back. “What are you looking at?”

“You.”

At first, he appeared taken aback by his honesty. Then he just scowled. “Don’t get any ideas, Dameron.” The poke of the alleged blade had left his thigh, but Hux’s entire form held the energy of a coiled spring. “Look – I’m quite happy for us to part ways here with no fuss, and no bother. I’ve got nothing to gain in taking you out.” Now his lips curved, like the serpentine shift of a mouth about lowered fangs. “But if you try and take _me_ , I’ll raise hell.”

Almost befuddled, Poe could only stare. “What?”

And he actually laughed, a sound like low arterial pulse. “I’m going to die. Sooner, later, it doesn’t really matter. I’ll just keep on living until it happens.” Now he leaned forward, stretching across the table like dark shadow, eyes too bright. “But I won’t die like a rat in a cage. Try and take me in, and I’ll kill everyone in this bar. And then myself.” And his fingers closed on the empty glass, his smile unsheathed blade. “If you want to be part of that, be my guest. But I won’t be yours.”

With undisguised wonder, Poe looked nowhere else but to him. “I always knew you were insane,” he said. “But this is a whole new level, Hugs.”

With a grimace he leaned back, let go the glass. “Really? You’re still doing that? Here? _Now_?”

A shrug did little to release the tension building in his spine. “It suits you.” Even as Hux kept staring, he did it again. “So. You want another drink?”

“…you think getting me drunk is going to get you what you want?”

“You’re a navy man. I’m assuming you could drink me right under this table.”

“Army. And I’d give it a good go.” Some sort of decision appeared to have been made; only in his eyes did Poe see the weariness the man had to be operating under. “All right. Fine. Another round.”

“Well, it’s not like you’re going anywhere, is it?” The expression on his face made it all worth it; Poe stood up without another word, turning to the bar. He didn’t quite expect him to still be there when he returned. But he was – silent, staring at the datapad.

“Workaholic, still?” Sliding a glass across to him, he couldn’t resist, “Thought you were between jobs.”

Hux didn’t glance up. “I still have work to do.”

With no particular smart aleck response to that, Poe busied himself with his new drink. He’d gotten about halfway through the glass when he couldn’t keep it to himself any longer. “So why’d you quit?”

“Management issues.” At Poe’s snort, Hux looked up. “Surely you realise Kylo Ren is insane.”

“Sure.” He watched Hux lock the pad, set it aside, take a long slug of his own drink. “But you are, too.”

“I came by that honestly.” Even as Poe opened his mouth to protest, he shook his head, the motion the sharp negation of one who expected to be obeyed without question. “I know what you think of me. Zealot, fascist, maniacal genocide.” He lingered a moment, staring into his drink, but did not raise the glass again. “But if you look back on what I came from, what else could I have been?”

Poe had to take a drink, himself. “I honestly don’t know,” he said, eventually. “But then people like Finn say it never _had_ to be this way.”

Damp fingers slid over the glass, grip tightening but failing all the same. “You and I, we were both born into this war. We’ve never known anything else.” Hux appeared to have some internal debate, then; before Poe could contribute, he gave it up. “Look. My father was an Imperial commandant. I grew up in a world under siege, then I was evacuated to the Unknown Regions under a military junta at the age of _five_.” For the first time, genuine emotion entered his words – so rarely heard, outside of his ranting speeches, or on the rare occasion Poe baited him to it via comms. “What do you suggest I should have done, then? Commandeered a star destroyer and come flying home to the New Republic? Joined a commune on Chandrila and learned how to be a real person?” He drained the glass down, set it down too hard. “Come on, Dameron. You know that’s not how it ends for people like me.”

“You still had choices.”

“I did. And I made them.” He shoved at the empty glass, though it only teetered upon the edge of the table, not quite fallen. “And now here I am. So how about you leave me to rot in this opened grave, like the decent person you claim to be?”

That left them only with silence, again. And Hux didn’t return to his datapad, watchful and resentful but mere feet away. Finishing his own drink, Poe stood up, walked away. When he returned, it was with a tray of small glasses.

“What is this?” Hux asked, though the gleam in his eyes said he knew. Poe slid back into his own chair, picked one up, knocked it back.

“I don’t know,” he said, quite honest. “But I’m not taking you in. Not without a fair fight.”

“Oh, so if you _do_ drink me under the table, I’m your prisoner?” His fingers reached forward, lingered over some hideously green concoction. “What happens if I win? Which I will, just by the by.”

“I don’t know,” he repeated. “I’m tired, Hugs.”

“Who isn’t?” His fingers closed about a pink one, and Hux held it up to him. “Cheers to that, then.”

Everything about this moment could only be called ridiculous at best, disastrous at best. It didn’t matter that it was the middle of the day, in a mostly empty bar. His contact might not have scheduled their meeting until the evening, but at this rate he would be staggeringly drunk by then. Or dead.

“What if there’s nothing, at the end of all this?” Poe asked, sudden, his fifth shot paused between table and lips. “They ended the war once, and it just started all over again.”

“How nice that it ended for _you_ ,” Hux retorted, and took his sixth without a flinch. “Like I said, _military junta_. No peacetime frolicking for _me_ , I can promise you that.”

“It just goes round and round.” Faintly horrified, Poe stared into the bottom of his glass, found the world beneath warped and strange. “We could end all this, and our children would just end up dying in the same battles.”

“Speak for yourself.” He scowled at the selection, still made his choice. “I don’t have any children.”

“Really?” Putting the glass down, Poe watched Hux take his, unable to look away. “I would have thought the Order would have had, like, extensive breeding programmes. Or something.”

“They do. I don’t participate.” The look he gave Poe then proved strangely penetrating. “What about you, Dameron? A half dozen bastards, perhaps, scattered around the galaxy?”

“Dude.” He took his shot, coughed at the kick of it. “I’m gay as fuck.”

“Ah.” He paused, then, looked very hard at the remaining shots. Too hard, perhaps. “Should’ve known.”

“Why’s that?”

And he looked up; despite the alcohol, both words and eyes were perfectly even. “All that flirting. On the comms.” One hand rose, and he leaned his chin upon it, eyebrow raised. “You must have a boy in every port.”

Poe had never felt quite so sober as he had in that moment. “Not in this port.”

And he smiled, steady, humourless. “Do you want one?”

It could only be a terrible mistake. But the idiocy of the situation had spun far beyond even his control long before now. “Is this just a way for you to get me in a back alley before you cut my throat?”

“It would be less messy than doing it in here,” he granted, and then just sighed. “But in all honesty, Dameron: I haven’t slept in a week, my ship’s dead, I have no idea if Kylo Ren can use his fake impossible magic to find me from halfway across the galaxy, and I’m halfway to dead drunk. I also haven’t had a good fuck in almost a year.” All weariness disappeared again in but a second, like the flip of a switch. “Yes or no?”

Poe passed his tongue over dry lips. “Yes.”

“Fine.” When he stood, there was but the faintest sway to his stance. “Follow me.”

He moved with strange dignity to the back of the cantina. Two steps behind, Poe watched him begin to negotiate a room. When his hand came to rest sudden on his forearm, Hux jumped, looked to him with something not quite irritation. Poe did not miss that this was the first time they had voluntarily touched.

“Wait,” he said, clear, low. “I know another place.”

When they walked out of the cantina, it was into the bright daylight of mid-afternoon. Squinting into the sun, Hux reached for his hood, then left it. His hair blazed like wildfire as he glanced over to the berths just across the way.

“Which one’s yours?”

“Little blue and white one.” Raking a hand back through his hair, his hand moved reflexively to the fob in his jacket pocket. “Why? You want to fuck in orbit?” Even as Hux threw him a disgusted look, he couldn’t help the wiggle of his eyebrows. “Us flyboys know how to give a smooth ride, there _and_ back.”

“No.” He turned firmly away. “Down here is fine.”

Poe hailed a speeder to take them into the small city proper. Seated beside each other, he figured they looked perfectly ordered and respectable despite the sway of the world around them. It was nothing but fool arrogance, to bring Hux to the neat little inn where he was supposed to meet his contact. It didn’t help that he told himself it was being practical, even as he checked in, even as he led Hux up the stairs.

The room had its own small balcony; its twinned doors had been propped open already, permitting the scent of flowers, a faint hum of insects, and the not-quite-distant song from a holo unit downstairs. Broad daylight made the impossibility of all of this just that much starker. Still Poe stood in silence, back to the door, watching as General Armitage Hux shed first his robe, and then all of what he wore entirely.

Now naked, he stood tall and unselfconscious of his body, lips curved downwards. “If this is where you throw me over the balcony without my clothes,” he snapped, “could you hurry up and do it?”

Despite his tone, Hux’s cock was already half-hard. It was the work of seconds to step forward, to go to his knees. And then Poe indulged in the perfect pure idiocy of taking it into his mouth. It grew all the harder with his gasp, hands digging into his hair. Walking him backwards, to the bed, Poe gave him a shove; he sat down hard. There Poe insinuated himself between pale knees, his own hands coming up to fan over thighs, thumbs digging into the crease of his groin.

The hair proved bright red here too, neatly trimmed. Drawing back, Poe dragged a flattened tongue over the head, sloppy and careless. Looking up along the length of his body, he found it so very thin. It hadn’t ever seemed that way, when he’d been pressed and perfect in his uniform. And there was almost some colour to him, now, in the lengthening golden light of a planetside afternoon.

“What are you looking at?” Hux asked, edgy; Poe grinned just below the jut of his reddened dick.

“You.”

“Oh, so now I’m not enough for you, am I?”

And he snorted, resisted the urge to bare his teeth. “It’s hard to take you seriously, almost,” Poe said, thoughtful. “I keep waiting for that Imperial accent to come back. All sharp and spiky.”

“Is that what you want?”

“Nope.” Standing, now, he loomed over him with an even wider grin. “This is good.”

Still fully clothed, Poe now leaned forward to lay his entire weight upon him. As if in reflex, long bare legs rose to wind tight about his waist. Though slender, it appeared the erstwhile general had a bit of strength to him, too. The fingers in his hair pulled tighter in unspoken echo, as if he had a liking for that. And he continued to prove himself a good kisser; even as Poe matched his enthusiasm, he couldn’t quite kill the faint uncomfortable memory of what the mechanic had told him back in the dockyards.

 _You know what they say about Arkanian boys_.

The kisses soon became scrambled between gasps and licks; leaning back to take a decent breath, cock straining at the restraint of his pants, Poe asked the question he could not avoid.

“Are you sure you want this?”

He’d expected rolled eyes, a snort, maybe even a heel aimed at his gut. Instead Hux lay still and steady beneath him, eyes cold steel blue. “I said so already, didn’t I?”

“You’re drunk.”

“So are you,” he observed, and then rocked upward. This time when those long bare fingers curled in his hair, Hux pulled. _Hard_. “But not that drunk,” he added, and flopped back down, thighs wide, dick hard against the small soft swell of his belly. “Get naked, Dameron.”

It didn’t take long. He did it while standing at the edge of the bed, just between his knees. Hux, for his part had half propped himself up on one elbow to watch the show; his other hand had gone to his cock. He did it as if an afterthought, though Poe suspected he knew perfectly well how distracting it would be. Strangely, he didn’t use the whole fist – just the first two fingers, and his thumb. There was something surprisingly neat, almost prissy in the up and down slide of it.

Poe had gotten down to his underwear when it hit him. “We need lube,” he said, sudden. “Barriers.”

His tongue traced the smooth line of his upper teeth, white and straight. “I have both.”

“…really?”

“I told you already I haven’t had a decent fuck in a year.” When he laughed out loud, it seemed to echo from the ceiling, the walls, inside his own foolish mind. “What do you think I came here for?” And now Hux tilted his head, pity oozing from the words like blood from an old wound. “Oh, so you thought you were _special_ , Dameron?”

With that, Poe was on him. Every movement of hand and leg and hip came fierce, hard; though shorter in height, Poe knew how to best take advantage of his own greater mass. Shoving Hux into, up to the head of the bed, he narrowly avoided biting his lower lip; in retaliation, Hux’s hands came about his waist, with smooth motion plunging into his underwear. There he shoved them down, grasping his ass, grinding their cocks together at last. And still they kissed, gasping into one another’s mouths, the scent and taste of alcohol rich yet upon their tongues.

Poe drew back first, Hux’s hands vice-grip about his forearms. Leaning down, he treated himself to another suck on that lovely cock; while not overly large, it proved long and slim, much like the rest of the man. He allowed himself the brief thought as to what it might feel like, up his own ass. Then Poe grasped Hux under the knees, pulling up, looking down to the fine little white ass beneath.

Any words of protest caught in that taut little throat when Poe bent himself to discover the taste of it, clean and musky both; with an experimental swipe of tongue, he earned himself a gasp, half-smothered and indignant. “Oh, Hugs,” he murmured, shifting his head to rasp stubble over soft skin. “better give up on that, because I’m gonna make you _scream_.”

The thighs closed tight about his ears. “Just try it, Dameron.”

Slipping down and away, Poe reached over to Hux’s things; he’d actually _folded_ everything. Taking inordinate pleasure it rooting through the entire pile for something easily enough found, he then stood directly in Hux’s eyeline. Only when he had the man’s attention did he rip open a barrier, sliding it on before tossing the wrapper aside.

“Pick that up.”

“What?” He prowled close, quick. “No. I’m busy.”

Even as Hux seemed upon the very verge of an actual sulk, Poe came back to him. Pushing down, again, he indulged more in the kissing that the general did so well, this time freely letting his slick dick rub along the crease of his ass. In turn, Hux’s fingers already moved down to play their own part. Poe expected him to slick himself up from the excess on Poe’s cock, to get himself ready. But to his shock, Hux took him in firm hand, thick head already pressed hard against the tight little hole.

“Wait, whoa—”

He slid in to tight heat – and Hux made it worse, with a sharp gasp and a hard clamp down. In a temporary white-out of vision, Poe stopped dead, for a moment sure he _was_ dead. Then Hux’s hands closed on his cheeks, not quite hard enough to be a slap; they pressed harder, eyes too bright and too blue.

“Hurry up and fuck me, flyboy.” His lips curled in something that might have been a scowl, might have been a smirk. “Or is the ride over already?”

It would be so easy just to pound in. Slowly leaning in instead, Poe kept their eyes locked. A slow kiss, reluctantly returned – and then he folded Hux in half beneath his greater weight, elbows hooked under his knees. Long kisses followed, with but the faintest shift of hips. Poe had to grin, faint and true, at the leak of a cock pressed tight between their shivering bellies.

He’d curled one hand behind Hux’s head, almost cradling, just to take his weight; the sharp crimson of his hair lay but a moment from callused fingertips. Hux’s own hand now rose to his back, its rest there almost tentative. Only when the palm flattened did Poe pause.

“Dameron.”

He grinned. “What?”

“Fuck. Me.” Then, without another word: “ _Please_.”

With both hands braced now either side of his head, Poe had no choice but to thrust. Hux’s wordless moans matched the shove upwards of his hips, greedy and demanding even as Poe’s force rendered such desire nearly obsolete. Then, he changed tack; first cradling his face, then moving both hands down to his ass, Hux drew him further in, fingertips digging deep. Through it all they stared nowhere else but directly into one another’s eyes. Poe knew he should have looked away. He could have just closed them. But he did not, even as Hux did exactly the same.

When he drew himself up, seeking greater leverage, Poe pulled back; promptly his dick fell out, Hux’s hiss a perfect expression of purest dismay. Immediately Poe shoved it back in, too hard; Hux’s head rolled back, eyes following, back arching to take him deeper still. One elegant hand now pumped his cock in that oddly endearing little way, thumb pushing into the leaking head, throat working around each stuttering gasp.

Hux was so near. Poe knew he himself veered too close to that same edge. It hadn’t been quite a year for him, but it had been enough. His orgasm almost blind-sided him; he pulled out so close to too late. Even as he snapped the condom off his dick twitched and spurted, come spilling over Hux’s heaving abdomen. The disgusted look on Hux’s face vanished but a moment later when Poe reached between them, three fingers sliding into smooth grasping heat, each crooked in just the right way. One, two, three efficient pumps and he was gasping, coming, holding tight enough to bruise Poe around both wrists.

Withdrawing his hand, wiping it lazily on the sheets, Poe flopped down at his side. The world still spun on all around them both. He supposed that meant that the galaxy itself did, too. When he breathed deep, the scent of sex tasted visceral and bright upon his tongue, but somewhere behind it he could still just make out the lighter floral notes. Another song played in the distance, now, accompanied by something he figured might be laughter. If he shifted, just a little, the sun fell warm and welcome on bare skin.

“I need another drink.”

“Really?” Lazy, now, Poe rolled over; an easy movement and he straddled that narrow chest, scooting to that pouting reddened mouth. “Still something left in this, I think?”

Though Hux rolled his eyes, he raised his head long enough to give Poe’s limp cock a long and lazy lick. Then, he shoved him back, already swinging his legs over the edge of the bed. “I need a shower.”

“So do I.” He couldn’t quite keep his eyes off the little white ass sashaying across the way. “And it’s my room. I call first dibs.”

The look Hux shot back over one shoulder could almost be called coquettish. “Try it, flyboy.”

They ended up taking it together, even in the narrow stall. Hux fucked into him, slow and steady – it turned out Poe had been right, and that cock managed to get what felt impossibly deep. But even after this second coming, they didn’t part. They spent longer just kissing, caressing, wasting as much water and soap as there was on offer. Poe said nothing about the scars on Hux’s arms or back, even as the sharp blue gaze dared him every time his fingers tripped over yet another one.

They returned to the bed, dry and naked; after stripping back the ruined coverlet, Poe flopped down first. Hux remained standing, drinking from the bottle of water on the nightstand. Only when it had all gone did he look down, oddly regal despite the fact he wore not a stitch of the uniform Poe knew far better than the skin beneath.

“You’re really not going to drag me back to your princess.”

Spoken so flatly, Poe knew nothing of the emotion behind it. He only shrugged. “In case you hadn’t noticed, Red,” and he cast a hand over his bared body, “sometimes I can be a bit of a fuck up.”

The scoffing laughter he expected never came. Instead the bed bowed beneath even his slight weight, Hux now beside him, staring into the distance beyond the opened balcony door.

“This was stupid.”

“Indeed it was.” He didn’t bother to stifle a yawn. “Probably won’t go like this next time.”

Frank curiosity had him turning, meeting his upward gaze. “You want there to be a next time?”

Yawning, again, Poe stretched his spine, winced at the crick of his back. Hux had no knives on him now, though he wasn’t quite stupid enough to think that meant they weren’t there still. “I kept calling you, didn’t I?” he asked, and Hux snorted, turning away.

“Go to sleep, idiot.”

If he did, he might never wake up. Poe let his eyes fall closed anyway. And he couldn’t be surprised when he opened them again to find himself alone, in the dark, and impossibly late to his rendezvous. Without bothering to turn on the bedroom’s lights he stumbled into the ‘fresher, splashed water on his face. After flicking on these lights to their lowest setting, he at last dared a look in the mirror, knowing he wouldn’t like what he saw there.

But it was worse than that. Even before he read the message, he knew he’d check his jacket only to find the access fob to his ship missing. Still he smiled as he looked to what had been written in improbable lipstick upon the reflective glass; the words immediately preceding the comms code were as curved and sharp as the man’s smile last had been.

_Looking for a good time? Call Hugs._

And then just beneath, one last thing, like a shivering kiss left upon a drowsing brow:

_It’s never just the once._


End file.
